Timmie Boy
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2002
3 of us returned home on Wednesday 14th August after 2 week holiday.
Well it was our first time in Florida. All started well as we treated ourselves to the twilight check-in at Gatwick and booked in overnight at the Hilton.
Flight very good with Virgin and touched down at Orlando with no probs. Picked up the hire car and drove to Kissimmee on the 417 took the wrong turning somewhere but finally got to Econolodge near to Kissimmee old town. Gulp, what a shock when we went to our room - smell of damp and the terrible drone from the air conditioning units. We got our room changed without the damp smell. This reminded me of your typical dingy motel you see in the old "B" movies. Mind you it was clean and tidy just a little rough at the edges, especially after the treat we had staying at the Hilton!
Anyway we strolled down to the nearest restaurant which was the Longhorn. Great inside, typically American feel to it with a bit of the wild west in there. Had a fantastic t-bone steak.
Worst was to follow in the morning. We woke up, got ourselves ready and then the mrs went to get our 10 day passes for Disney from our suitcases - not there, panic! We just couldn't find them anywhere, traced our steps, no clues. The only time the cases were out of our sight was when we twilight checked in at Gatwick, and thats where we went wrong I think. In hindsight we should've kept the tickets with us all the time but I do believe that they were taken from our cases overnight at the airport.
We went to the Virgin welcome get together at Downtown. Saw a rep there called Alex. He did our best to help us but all to no avail. I had bought the tickets ( the actual credit card type) from Keith Prowse via the Virgin travelstore. Phoned Keith Prowse and they recommended that I cancel the tickets so that they couldn't be used. Not what I wanted to hear! I said I'll wait a couple of days in case they turned up. While we waited we went to Kennedy space station the following day. That was brilliant but slightly dampened by the missing tickets still in the back of my mind.
So got back to Keith Prowse to cancel the tickets as they hadn't turned up, spoke to a different lady and she said hang on if I give you the serial numbers of the tickets then Disney world may be able to help you. Great!! It worked! Went to guest relations at MGM and the guy there printed us the new passes there and then fantastic!! We could now enjoy the rest of our holiday!
Well people did warn us that it would be hot and steamy at this time of year - and how true they were. Anyway we had a great time and also managed to go to Discovery cove and swim with the dolphins! Superb. I won't give you a day-by-day blow of what we did. We did everything that is already mentioned in this forum, the only thing we didn't do was any of the Universal stuff. Maybe when we come back in 5 or 6 years we will do that and perhaps drive out of the tourist areas and see more of the real America as we found the orlando set-up purely for tourism and nothing else.
I would thoroughly recommend this holiday to anybody. But once you've seen one park then you've seen them all.
Well it was our first time in Florida. All started well as we treated ourselves to the twilight check-in at Gatwick and booked in overnight at the Hilton.
Flight very good with Virgin and touched down at Orlando with no probs. Picked up the hire car and drove to Kissimmee on the 417 took the wrong turning somewhere but finally got to Econolodge near to Kissimmee old town. Gulp, what a shock when we went to our room - smell of damp and the terrible drone from the air conditioning units. We got our room changed without the damp smell. This reminded me of your typical dingy motel you see in the old "B" movies. Mind you it was clean and tidy just a little rough at the edges, especially after the treat we had staying at the Hilton!
Anyway we strolled down to the nearest restaurant which was the Longhorn. Great inside, typically American feel to it with a bit of the wild west in there. Had a fantastic t-bone steak.
Worst was to follow in the morning. We woke up, got ourselves ready and then the mrs went to get our 10 day passes for Disney from our suitcases - not there, panic! We just couldn't find them anywhere, traced our steps, no clues. The only time the cases were out of our sight was when we twilight checked in at Gatwick, and thats where we went wrong I think. In hindsight we should've kept the tickets with us all the time but I do believe that they were taken from our cases overnight at the airport.
We went to the Virgin welcome get together at Downtown. Saw a rep there called Alex. He did our best to help us but all to no avail. I had bought the tickets ( the actual credit card type) from Keith Prowse via the Virgin travelstore. Phoned Keith Prowse and they recommended that I cancel the tickets so that they couldn't be used. Not what I wanted to hear! I said I'll wait a couple of days in case they turned up. While we waited we went to Kennedy space station the following day. That was brilliant but slightly dampened by the missing tickets still in the back of my mind.
So got back to Keith Prowse to cancel the tickets as they hadn't turned up, spoke to a different lady and she said hang on if I give you the serial numbers of the tickets then Disney world may be able to help you. Great!! It worked! Went to guest relations at MGM and the guy there printed us the new passes there and then fantastic!! We could now enjoy the rest of our holiday!
Well people did warn us that it would be hot and steamy at this time of year - and how true they were. Anyway we had a great time and also managed to go to Discovery cove and swim with the dolphins! Superb. I won't give you a day-by-day blow of what we did. We did everything that is already mentioned in this forum, the only thing we didn't do was any of the Universal stuff. Maybe when we come back in 5 or 6 years we will do that and perhaps drive out of the tourist areas and see more of the real America as we found the orlando set-up purely for tourism and nothing else.
I would thoroughly recommend this holiday to anybody. But once you've seen one park then you've seen them all.
